TRENDSETTERS: Julian Boulding Considers Creativity Today & Looks at Cannes as an Indicator

According to thenetworkone's President, Julian Boulding, "Cannes is a significant indicator for two issues that concern us all: the state of the global economy and the state of the marketing communications business."

He continues, "On the first metric: the global economy has bounced back."

The awards contests at Cannes received a record number of entries, and the number of paying delegates was almost 10,000, close to the all-time high of 2008. Seminars were packed: get there early for Google, or don’t even think about seeing Eric Schmidt as you’d be high in the cheap seats in the balcony of the overflow theatre showing the live video feed.

So the global economy is fine (unless you live in Southern Europe, of course). But what about the marketing communications industry?

"First of all," says Boulding, "Our 'industry' no longer has a name. After many decades as an 'Advertising' festival, the conference that happens between the Film Festival and the convention of water treatment engineers is now known as the 'Festival of Creativity.'

Fair enough, it has to be called something, and the term advertising is now deeply unfashionable. But the curious thing was, that creativity was actually much further down the agenda than usual. At least, in the speeches and seminars."

Last Year & This Year

A keen observer of trends, Julian Boulding sums up:

"2010 was all about the 'what.' What is the industry doing? What was the role of brands? And most of all, what should companies stand for? Marc Pritchard of Procter & Gamble talked about his company's "purpose;' Jimmy Mayman of Go Viral noted how consumer's view of the company behind a brand influences response rates to marketing campaigns; Agnello Dias of Taproot talked about The Times of India’s CSR work in promoting reconciliation between India and Pakistan.

2011 was all about the 'how.' Everyone has now recognized that in an interconnected, interactive, collaborative, mobile world, the key challenge is how to engage with consumers in a creative and original way. After all, Cannes is now a festival of creativity, right?"

Greenberg’s Wisdom

According to Boulding, "If you really want to know where our business is going, listen to Bob Greenberg, CEO/Global Chief Creative Officer at R/GA. Basically, as Bob sees it, the world of marketing communications first moved from horizontal integration (global campaigns) to vertical integration (integrated campaigns, hence the Cannes titanium award, etc.) and is now about to move forward again, to functional integration.

Essentially, this means moving from platforms – already yesterday, for Bob, just when the rest of us had started to work them out – to ecosystems, where product, brand, company, technology and consumer are all crucial participants. As creative agencies become as skilled in technology as they are in creativity, they will become more than agencies – they will become business consultants. Their role will be to help marketing companies develop brands which 'create value for consumers, rather than simply enjoyment.'

Some fairly heavy hitters like Sapient, AKQA and Google would most likely agree with this.

And so too, apparently, does IPG: as they have decided to roll out the R/GA brand from the USA, not just to Europe but also in short order to Mumbai, to Shanghai, to Moscow and who knows where next."

For more of Julian’s Boulding’s thoughts, see the summer edition of The Internationalist, available online at the end of July.